“Consider where Trump and Biden stand on three key issue areas the Kremlin cares deeply about: NATO, political leadership in Ukraine and undermining democracy. Under Trump, there was little daylight between Russia and the United States on these issues.
Even as Trump’s vocal criticisms may have inadvertently strengthened the alliance, Trump worked to diminish the influence of NATO, reportedly planning to withdraw from it in his second term. As a candidate, Trump had even remarked that, “Maybe NATO will dissolve, and that’s OK, that’s not the worst thing in the world.”
Trump also broke with longstanding bipartisan support of Ukraine. During the Trump administration’s first year, Volodymyr Zelenskyy was still a showman whose comedy troupe performed patriotic musical numbers with lyrics like “There’s fog over Brussels and frost in Washington” and used a MeToo leitmotif comparing Ukraine’s treatment by Russia and the West to a sexual assault. When Zelenskyy beat an incumbent president in a landslide, Trump actually withheld military aid to Ukraine, sending personal emissaries to Kyiv to try to pressure and undermine Zelenskyy in the eyes of Ukrainians by asking him to “do us a favor, though.”
And both while in office and since leaving it, Trump worked tirelessly to cast doubt on the legitimacy of American elections, going to great yet unsuccessful lengths to find evidence of fraud in the 2020 presidential contest. Trump makes assertions about American elections that echo the Kremlin’s, even reciting a trope about voting by “dead souls” that comes from 19th century Russian literature. At rallies Trump repeats the same claims he made the day of the January 6 attack on the Capitol: “You don’t concede when there’s theft involved.”
The truth is that during his administration, Trump’s policy alignment with Putin advanced the aims of Russia’s political elites, who could imagine that the United States was on their side. Their comfort with Trump was evident from the start; Americans may remember that Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was warmly received in the White House and photographed in the Oval Office, while Russian parliament members toasted Trump’s electoral victory in 2016.
This comfort evaporated with the election of Biden. And for good reason: from the start, the Biden administration has been at odds with Putin on the issues Putin needs to care about to preserve his own rule. After Biden’s election, Russian political elites once again articulated profound, existential anxieties about a renewed United States projecting its power abroad. State television in Russia emphasized the Kremlin will not allow American influence in Ukraine, “regardless of the cost to us, and regardless of the cost to those responsible for it.”
The Biden White House has taken positions opposite those of the Trump administration on NATO. Biden has insisted on principles of state sovereignty, reaffirming and rebuilding the United States’ trans-Atlantic relationships, including strengthening NATO.
Biden took meaningful steps to support Ukraine in defending itself. Far from undermining Ukraine’s democratically elected government, the Biden administration has tried to create roadblocks for the Kremlin by getting inside Putin’s decision cycle, declassifying and broadcasting intelligence about Russia’s plans to attack Ukraine. Biden exhausted diplomatic channels trying to come to a peaceful resolution and worked with allies to prepare a sanctions package in advance of a Russian invasion.
And Biden has worked to protect democracy. Unlike Trump, rather than questioning the integrity of contests his party lost, Biden has spoken forcefully about the close legal scrutiny and fairness of all the 2020 elections. And he has supported congressional efforts to protect the franchise in the United States.
In Trump, Putin had a fellow-traveler. Far from ensuring world peace, the Trump years instead offered Putin a useful pause he utilized to further military readiness and prime the Russian population for a hot war. Earlier this month, the Russian state adopted new standards for mass graves — not because of the coronavirus pandemic in Russia, but for situations that involve “urban destruction.””
…
“Far from deterring Putin, Trump did the opposite. Thanks to Trump, Putin was able to take advantage of a period of apparent detente during which Trump actually pursued Putin’s own policies of weakening NATO and democracy and destabilizing the West — leaving Putin free to prepare his war against the free people of Ukraine and their democratically elected government.”
“US intelligence has warned that Putin aims to topple Ukraine’s government, round up prominent Ukrainians “to be killed or sent to camps,” and install a puppet regime in Kyiv. When Putin speaks of “de-Nazification” and “bringing [Ukrainians] to justice,” this is exactly what he means.
The word “demilitarization” hints at the real reasons he’s willing to do this: that he wishes to end Ukraine’s status as an independent sovereign state.
Putin believes that Ukraine is an illegitimate country that exists on land that’s historically and rightfully Russian. Zelensky’s willingness to move away from Moscow and toward the West is, in Putin’s mind, an attempt to legitimize the “false” regime in Kyiv. The existence of an anti-Russian regime in what he views as rightfully Russian territory populated by rightfully Russian people is unacceptable to him — so unacceptable that he is willing to wage a costly and bloody war over it.”
…
“talk of “de-Nazification,” while absurd on a factual level, is nonetheless revealing. It tells us that Putin is acting on his long-held belief that the Ukrainian government has no right to be independent. It hints at his ultimate goal: to transform Ukraine into a vassal of a new Russian empire.”
“The logic of mutually assured destruction that defined the Cold War still works, to some degree: Russia’s arsenal makes any direct intervention in Ukraine riskier than any rational American leader could tolerate. In a sense, then, Russia’s nuclear weapons make it less likely that the conflict will kick off World War III.
But in another sense, Russia’s nuclear arsenal also helped create the conditions where Putin’s invasion could happen in the first place.”
…
“Russia can be relatively confident that the United States and its allies won’t come to Ukraine’s defense directly, because such a clash carries the threat of nuclear war. This could make Putin more confident that his invasion could succeed.
Putin himself has suggested as much. In his speech declaring war on Wednesday night, he warned that “anyone who would consider interfering from the outside” will “face consequences greater than any you have faced in history” — a thinly veiled threat to nuke the United States or its NATO allies if they dare intervene.”
“Dozens of countries across the Middle East, South Asia, and North Africa that already suffer from food insecurity rely on Russia’s and Ukraine’s bountiful supplies of wheat, corn, and vegetable oil, and experts say the conflict could send food prices rising and
“Behind the rude awakening on energy security lies an even more unsettling realization for many German elites: That a decades-long goal of bringing Berlin and Moscow closer together through mutually beneficial trade seems to have failed.”
…
“The idea that growing trade links with other nations would help to gradually embed Western democratic standards in those countries has already taken a hit when it comes to China, which has only become more and more repressive despite growing economic links. Still, leading German politicians have long held out hope that “Wandel durch Handel” might still work with Russia, and defended Nord Stream 2 as a tool to also influence Russia for the better.
“Obviously, this policy has totally failed when it comes to Russia,” said Marcel Dirsus, a non-resident fellow at the Institute for Security Policy at Kiel University. He argued that instead of influencing Moscow by making Russia more dependent on Germany, the policy had the opposite effect.
“Right now, when push comes to shove, Berlin is dependent on Moscow when it comes to energy, and that influences the way it positions itself,” he said, referring to Berlin’s initial reluctance to include Nord Stream 2 in potential sanctions against Russia in the case of further aggression against Ukraine.
It took weeks of internal bickering and harsh international criticism before Scholz’s Social Democrats agreed to put the pipeline on the sanctions table.
“Now, they are coming to this realization [that they are too reliant on Russia] and now they are also admitting it in public, but now it’s too late,” Dirsus said.”
“The latest package would issue sanctions on two major Russian banks and on the country’s sovereign debt, meaning it can no longer raise money from the West and trade new debt on U.S. or European markets, the president said. Starting tomorrow, the U.S. will also impose sanctions on Russian elites and their family members, he added.
Biden called the moves “the first tranche” of punitive measures the U.S. is prepared to take, and he said they would go far beyond the steps the U.S. and its allies took in response to Russia’s invasion of Crimea in 2014.
“This is a flagrant violation of international law, and it demands a firm response from the international community,” he said of Putin’s decision to send Russian forces into the territories.
Biden also said the U.S. would continue to provide defensive assistance to Ukraine in the meantime, and said he has authorized additional movements of U.S. forces and equipment already stationed in Europe “to strengthen our Baltic allies — Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.””